Far Side Two
Copyright© 2025 by Gina Marie Wylie
Chapter 4
I
Andie Schultz was a busy bee when she left the headquarters building after talking to Glaive Trennys. Her first phone call was to Jon Bullman. “Thanks for arranging transportation for Erica Mirableu the other day.”
The man laughed. “You do realize you destroyed the Air Force? You not only obsoleted every one of their aircraft, but everything on the drawing boards? They are going to be redesigned from the ground up, and every single person in their organization is going to have to be retrained.”
“Well, in that case, I have another favor to ask of them. Get Kris Boyle to China Lake even faster if that’s possible, consistent with her safety. Right now, as fast as you can get it done.”
He was silent for a second. “And why?”
“Jon, you once, maybe two or three dozen times, asked me to trust you. I was a skeptical pain in the ass, but I generally did. Now, I have to ask you to trust me. All I can say now is that things have gone in shitter on Arvala. I swear to you I will brief you fully in a day or two. Of course, once I do that with special code word, compartmented intelligence, if there are any leaks here I’ll know you screwed up. Only Kris will have a full brief, and General Briggs a very peripheral one. He is my next call: Erica Mirableu was attacked last night before by what I’m going to say was a dralka. She survived, but her guard was crippled and returned home late yesterday, Arvalan time. His injuries were serious, but not life-threatening. Do not repeat this to anyone for any reason. Tippy top secret, lim dis, no forn, burn before reading.
“Among other things, I’m going to move up the action against the Tengri homeland. Starting in a few days. After your brief.”
“It’s important, yes?”
“The game has just changed. Now, I have to call General Briggs about the second attack on one of his students.”
“How badly was she hurt?”
“She was knocked silly and has a bruise the size of a dinner plate on her shoulder. Jon, the attack was a success. The dralha was after their weapons. Her guard was standing to her right, and he’s left-handed, and she’s right-handed. It split the difference between them, with the main attack against the soldier; he was carrying an AR-15. Erica was carrying a FN-90. She got off a couple of shots ... and never noticed the dralka had tried to grab her weapon as well. The sights were scraped and twisted. Evidently, she is one strong cookie.”
“I’ll get right on it. Talk to you when you can!”
Andie grit her teeth and dialed Norwich. It was late afternoon on Earth, and the general was in his office.
He was pleasantly pleased to hear from her and said, “How is Cadet Mirableu settling in?”
“Sir, I want you to do something first. Get Kris delivered to the same spot as Erica was; transportation is en route.”
General Briggs was no dummy, “Is Cadet Mirableu okay?”
“Sir, I need Kris on Arvala as quickly as she can get there. Erica is at work at the moment.”
“Just a minute,” and he changed lines and gave the order, then he was back.
“Andie, even though it only took a second to get Cadet Boyle moving, I had time to realize what a great, huge waffle what you said about Mirableu was.”
“The other thing is more important. Erica Mirableu has become a strategic asset of the first rank. The afternoon of the day after she arrived on Arvala, she wanted to look at the ocean; I’m told it was a pretty sunset. She had a guard, and he’d been here six months. They were less than a mile from the rookery when they were attacked by a dralka. Neither spotted the dralka before that attack, but Erica heard something and ducked, yelling ‘down’ to her guard. She was struck on the right shoulder by what my medic says must have been a shoulder or a wing tip -- she has a bruise the size of a dinner plate. She is fine, General, and really is at work right now.”
“However ... the guard was hit by a talon on his left side, badly gashing his arm and side. The last I heard, he was in danger of losing the arm. He was returned at once to Earth, and his condition is serious.”
Andie cleared her throat. “I can’t get into more than a few last details. The guard was armed with a military AR-15, and Erica was currying favor with her boss and had an FN-90. I took part in her debrief, sir. She said that while she was hitting the dirt, she seemed to lose her grip on her weapon. She firmed up and got off a three-round burst. She complained that the weapon, which Kurt Sandusky personally supervised her zeroing in, shot to the left. She didn’t notice the damage to the sights when the dralka tried to take her weapon from her. The dralka did get the guard’s AR-15, something we didn’t discover for more than an hour.”
“And she is now a strategic asset?”
“Yes, sir. I earlier spoke to Jon Bullman about the same thing and didn’t tell him anything either. I am going to have to brief him in a few days, but sir, you may not be briefed fully for months and months. It’s that important.”
“I have never had a problem with the need to know.” The general laughed. “Not only can’t you slip up, if you don’t know, no one can blame you for a leak.”
“Now I need to make a few more calls, and I will be at the Far Side door to greet Kris.”
“Take care, Miss Schultz. You are an important strategic asset in your own right.”
She dreaded the next call the most. “King Collum, it’s Andie.”
“Andie! How are you this fine day?”
“I’m going to come see you in a few hours. I hope to see you and Melek. Kris should be there as well.”
“You are always welcome ... either of you or both.”
“Hold onto that thought. I’ve reached some decisions -- some you’ll like and some you’ll probably want to question my sanity.”
Collum laughed. “Heavy lies the crown on my head. I make decisions like that every day.”
“Yet, you can still laugh. Today will try your patience.”
“Tell me now, Andie. I value your sage advice too much ... and I trust you like no other.”
“This is for you and Melek only. Not the techs working the radios, not for anyone who might be listening.”
“You have assured me that the Tengri can’t even hear that I am talking.”
“Yes, but this is secret even from my own people. I’ll be there as soon as Kris arrives at the Far Side door. Then the four of us need to talk. I want Linda to stay here, but she knows and can act as a resource for general information.”
Linda, ever a presence at Andie’s elbow, grimaced. Still, she nodded. “Andie, it’s 0915.”
“I have a meeting. I’ll be there in three hours or so.”
II
Kurt Sandusky stood as Andie entered the conference room. He was nearly six feet compared to Andie’s four feet six, with a blond brush cut, and still whiplash thin even approaching fifty.
“Sit down, Major. I have some breaking news, and you’re going to think I’m crazy. Best be seated; we have a lot of work to do and much less time than I had planned,” Andie told him.
He sat, and Andie and Linda did as well. “First, the crazy. You know about Erica’s contacts with the dralha.”
“Purported contacts.”
“She named two Americans who have been compromised. One name she could have theoretically heard, but not the other. Plus two Arvalan names: Mardan and Seros. She could have learned those names from Kris, but the other two names are golden. Still, caution is wise. Which is why you’re going to think I’ve lost it.
“Erica says that in three days, two thousand dralka will attack the Tengri island base, intent on wiping it out. I made a judgment call. While it is said ‘the enemy of my enemy is my friend,’ it is also said that the enemy of my enemy is just that: go slow! You have to consider the enemies. I posit that the dralha are the worst enemy, but there is no way I’m going to ally with either one. Still, I called up Trennys on the radio and warned him. Then I warned him I’d be coming for the Emperor in a few days.”
Kurt opened his mouth to say something, and closed it without speaking. After a minute, he said mildly, “The Arvalans aren’t going to be happy.”
“King Collum and Melek will be distinctly unhappy. I will make the point that someone enslaved by the Tengri can opt to kill themselves. That is not an option with the dralha. I will tell them that I am going to take the battle to the Tengri homeland at once. There is little chance the dralha can reach the other continent, and so we can stop Tengri re-enforcements at the source. A nice outcome would be the Tengri giving up slaves and joining us in the defense against the dralha. The watchwords would be ‘trust, but verify.’
“I envision a guerrilla war, attacking their supply of new slaves to begin with, then start liberating them in the Tengri homeland. We would form Far Side doors, go in, strike, and vanish back through the doors. We keep that up for as long as it takes them to wake up: waking up means figuring out what is going on, or if they give up. I posit a hundred white special operators and maybe ten or fifteen African-Americans for intelligence work.”
Kurt nodded. “You need to speak to Jake about the spec ops guys. You might avail yourself of an expert or two on psy-war; they can really play with people’s heads.”
“You don’t think I’m crazy?”
“Andie, you’re a fuckin’ genius. You may be as good as Alexander or Patton, I don’t know. If you want to run a company of M-1A1 tanks up their asses, I’m your guy. I really think I could run a tank brigade or regiment; I could probably manage a squad of special ops guys if I had a good sergeant. You are going to need permission from the President to do any of this. Ollie Boyle promised the guy we wouldn’t go starting the First Interstellar War. He deserves to know that you can’t keep that promise.”
III
Erica had to admit she was more uncomfortable than she expected. She went to the door and stuck her head out and saw the guard. “I dressed rather fast this morning. Do you have a pocket knife?”
“Swiss Army okay?” he said seriously.
“Yes, I have a pain pill I want to cut in half.”
She opened the proffered blade, but when she got out one of the pills, she got some advice. “Good idea. Yeah, druggies can pop two or three at a time, but I played football at UT, and once I sprained my ankle. The team doc gave me a half pill, but it zonked me. You don’t want to get zonked on duty. A quarter pill.”
She cut the pill into quarters and popped one of the pieces. “Thanks!”
“Emil Watson, Miss...”
“Erica Mirableu, I matriculate at Norwich.”
“You know Charles?”
“I’m supposed to get to know him, but not yet.”
“I was there at Siran-Ista. Leg soldiers never impressed me before, but he made a believer of me! I sure wished he had his Barrett there at the Battle of the Point. That was entirely too hairy.”
Andie and Linda Walsh appeared, and Erica excused herself and reentered the map room.
“Anything new on the dralha front?”
“Mother just woke up while I was getting the pain pills cut down to size. I was warned that even a half pill could ‘zonk’ me. I’ll tough it out for a while longer because I don’t know what the effect of being zonked is.”
Andie cussed under her breath. “Broke my leg once. The doc said he needed to give me an injection to get the right dose of painkiller. That was just before the fucker sawed off a crutch and announced to the emergency room, ‘a tiny tot size crutch.’ I hit him in the balls with the damn thing and volunteered to give the fucker an injection for the pain. Yeah, the next words out of the doc’s mouth were, ‘that’s the pain meds talking.’ I hit him again and asked if he wanted me to repeat my message a third time.”
Andie pointed to the radio. “Let’s get this show on the road.”
Contact was reestablished, and Charles had a question at once. “Danei asks how can we trust you since you know how to make Far Side doors anywhere?”
“Charles, I need rather specific, unique landmarks to form the door in the right place. I’ve been experimenting, and when I’ve been to a place before, I can form the door within a few feet. From a good color picture, I can get within a hundred yards. Somewhere just described to me, well, my ability to form a door to the right place is about 90 percent and can be off by a mile. Climb up on deck, Charles, and tell me what landmarks you see?”
It took a while for Charles to come back. “I explained to Danei; needless to say, she’s baffled by the whole thing.”
“She’s not alone! I am currently the subject of a Federal injunction forbidding me to form any more Far Side doors between different points on Earth; every airline on the planet joined in the suit, stating I have an unfair competitive advantage. The US patent office has tentatively given me a patent, but there are about two hundred lawsuits seeking to overturn it.
“Look, we were going to be there on the docks when you came in. We were going to tell Danei’s father his daughter was safe as soon as you were past the Tengri. It wouldn’t be fair to tell him she is alive one day, then have to go some days later and tell him she has fallen out of contact and may be lost. I just can’t tell you more until you are far from where you are now, and then it will be limited.”
“Okay, Danei trusted me and described her home. It is three stories, set on a hill covered with fruit trees, looking out over a wide river valley. About ten miles away, on the other side of the river, is the B’Lugi capital, Farallon. Beyond the city is the ocean. Sixteen hundred years ago, Farallon was an important farming and market town miles from the ocean until the catastrophe. Then the land sank, the original port vanished beneath the waves, and the sea advanced most of the distance to Farallon. They had no trouble moving the city because when the ground shook, all the buildings in the city collapsed, so they moved it down to where the ocean was. From the descriptions, the land was a river delta, and there were reports that the ‘earth turned to water.’”
He went in to fill in details of the buildings and plants, the colors, and other things. “This is fine, Charles. Two last things. The first is that I’ve told Jon Bullman we are going in two days. I have a shit pot of work to do, but Kris is coming here. Monica is going to have come with us, but Erica will remain. What is the likely reaction going to be of people arriving who speak current Tengri and classic, more or less, Builder?”
“Danei says your white skins will help. Still, you may well start out as prisoners.”
Andie laughed. “I hope it works out better for them than it did for Mardan and company.”
“The last thing is, I told Erica to stay to communicate with you. She will be fully briefed with the special intelligence on the Tengri ships. Further, I herewith authorize Erica Mirableu to speak in my name. I warn you that she has special intelligence about the location of the predators. She can’t talk about it, I can’t talk about it, but as far as you are concerned, her reports are golden, a value of ten.”
Charles sighed. “I avoided all of that while I was in the Sandbox. Denise ... Colonel Levi was aghast that she had told me about Danei’s ship. Maybe I was wrong about avoiding intelligence.”
“Charles, when you are fighting an existential threat to people you like, you use every advantage you can get.”
He didn’t talk for a minute and then came back. “I told Danei that. She’s pretty broken up.”
“When she was here, I told her about what Patton said. She needs to buckle down and get with the program. I hope you are doing what I told you earlier.”
“Yes. On this course, we should pass through the first Tengri line in four days.”
“I promise, I will watch out for you. Monica and Erica will as well. We recorded this; I’ll have someone transcribe the notes. Now I need to get myself off to Arvala.”
“A week?”
“I can do it in ten minutes if I want these days, but I need to talk to people on Earth for a bit, and Kris isn’t due for a couple of hours.”
Erica waited until the connection was broken. “Andie, Mother is wide awake now. She just received a scout report of a ship about three hundred miles east of Mother, a bearing of ninety-three degrees from where Mother is. She visualized a map in her head. She is on the northeastern corner of the landmass, on a peninsula that projects mostly northeast. It was the center of their exploration efforts for a quarter of the continent. The scout was at the end of its range and reports that the crew is ‘black humans’ like those the little cousins have found far to the north.”
Erica stopped and then smiled. “It seems that males are enthralled as well by female dralha and can’t enthrall either. Mother is going to attack that ship. She has no intention of letting it get away.”
Andie got up and gestured for a half dozen people to join her in front of the map. She looked at Erica. “Please, you are going to hear intelligence analysis. Please bear with us.
“Monica?”
“We were discussing this yesterday. The Tengri have a line of ships about fifty miles apart. The furthest south ship is two hundred miles south of the next ship, a tempting gap in the line. We heard from a ship that was supposed to be in the gap report a broken mast and they were returning to base. All of us, each and everyone, think that was misinformation and that they continued on under radio silence.
“Three hundred miles further east, there is a similar line ... except it doesn’t extend as far south and there is no longer than the others’ gap. We rate most of the ships on the line as frigates, similar to Danei’s. We thought we’d identified some three-deckers, but they all put into the island base, then the next transmission was on the way home ... then silence. We think that at least three heavy warships are at the midpoints of the smaller gaps. Erica, do you know what the ship they spotted looked like?”
“One row of gunports, and yes, they know what those are. They are intensely interested in the technology, but have no idea how cannons work. Mother, however, is a very clever critter. She’s heard of the billows of smoke, assumes it is something burning very fast ... and figures that is a clue. Cannonballs move too fast for them to see, so all they see is the smoke coming out.”
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